Remember The Time by Michael Jackson

I have been tasked with making these costumes...but for kids. As soon as I find out who will play Eddie Murphy's part, I am so totally going to start up the helmet by carving down green flower blocks, hotgluing some type of macaroni, and spraying it down with gold paint.

Anybody have any suggestions for making the gold portion of Michael Jackson's costume?

My deadline is June, so I need to get started now. It doesn't have to be that accurate but it needs to look great and not home-made.

I just found out that my 7-year Ashton is going to play Eddie Murphy's part, and my oldest son, Dylan is going to play Michael Jackson's part....I purchased supplies to work on the hats and have ordered the mylar tape. Tomorrow I will work on the hats for the king and queen. I bought a ball of white foam to carve for the king's hat.

Total spent so far: $50 fabric, $30 mylar tape, $80 art supplies...for a total of $160.

Here's the queen's hat. Remember, the Queen is only going to be 8 years old...so I took some artistic liberties....I just need to sculpt the cobra. God it looks like crap...but 30 feet away when it's onstage...you won't really notice.

I'm starting on the king's hat now...

I kind of splurged on the gold trim because I did not want to drive to the bigger store and basically got what they had available at Michael's....so now the running total is $170.

It's going to take me forever to sculpt the little circles on the hat...so I found a quick solution...I need to go to the grocery store and buy some more of this cereal and the plan is to cover up the hat with a type of thin fabric I find in my stash...spray it with glue, put the cereal on top and spray the hell out of it with gold...

I'm very impressed with how this is coming along. And your kids are so cute!
Do you have to make the staffs that Eddie Murphy is holding in the photo? I can't see the one very clearly, but the other could be the top of a cane or umbrella sawed off. Or in a pinch, you could use one of those candy cane-shaped sleeves that come filled with candy. On his collar, is that beadwork? Are you going to do that or maybe paint/glue them onto thick material?

Almost done! I just have to make sure it fits properly...adjust...and then glue down the helmet liner. And add the glitter paper on the front panel.

Click to expand...

WoW!!!!!! That has to be one of the most creative uses of food I have ever seen! When you first mentioned using some type of macaroni I was scratching my head... but seriously. WoW! Awesome, awesome job! Can't wait to see the rest.

For the collars, I don't know yet until I cross that bridge. I am thinking of getting vinyl and hot gluing some velcro to get a cone-ish shape that would drape over the collar bone. Not sure if I am saying that clearly enough...and then probably hot gluing some kind of cheap plastic jewelry I find. We have to go super cheap...I already spent $171 and I have not purchased yarn for the girl dancers hair and headdress material for the boy dancers. Today I will measure the kids.

Yesterday I decided to rework the queen's hat to remove the stitches and just use hot glue...but I messed up and the front looks messy. Luckily I can slap on some more foam on top of that and it will be an easy fix.

Yes we will videotape. This is for that show I am hoping to find some costumers to participate in to add some Hollywood flavor on June 30.

If I have time, I will do the staff--if I can find some of that plastic Christmas candy cane lawn stuff that I can melt into the right shape.

Maybe I went a little too dark with the front panel...it's a little bronze...but I like it.

Here's what I came up with for the jewels for the collars...because the little tiny jewels were going to be very expensive and time consuming to hot glue down. This is peel and stick glitter foam. I will just cut the shapes out and peel and stick to the vinyl collars. I have 60 days to return whatever I don't use, in case I bought too much.

Couldn't find that exact fabric for the headgear, so I found something but did not have a 40% off coupon. Will return to JoAnn's with coupon in hand. The project is now at $240...and I still need to buy at least 6.5 yards of white jersey fabric. I bought out all they had at the local fabric store at $4.50 per yard...but a lower grade of this fabric is selling at $12.99/yard at JoAnne's. Hopefully I can find white jersey bedsheets at Target or Ross...

Had to make a turtleneck from swim material--need to spray paint more gold on it...because Dylan refused to let me spray paint one of his compressor shirts...The cost of this fabric was about $5.

Test of the mylar tape...I prefer thin foam underneath because it gives it a solid weight. The shape to the left of the photo has thin cardboard underneath. I will need to cut out my foam pieces first...and then trim the mylar around it. If I put the mylar on and cut it...the edges look ragged. So excited to work on this but can't today because I have a field trip to attend.

So tired. I finished 3 panels...and started on the 4th but I messed up..so I have to make more of those gold things and reglue. Once it's glued on, you can't remove it without leaving a crease...even if you soften the glue with an iron. I'm getting really sloppy so I should just put away my project for the night. Tomorrow is another day. Anyway, the goal is to finish the top part of the shirt tomorrow, and tonight just think about how I am going to make the belt with what I have. I already have 4 costumes sewed, so I need to sew 11 more.

Very overwhelming because I am doing all the costumes for this one particular dance and nothing else.

#1: Your kids are adorable!
#2: This is really great work and such a unique project - I love how innovative people are on these boards. The comparison of Cereal O's to Pasta made me smile. Looking forward to the finished project.
#3: This all begs the question - what is this for?

I'm madly in love with this thread and project right now. I don't know how I didn't notice it until just now but it's brilliant. Doing costumes for children is great because it forces you to be creative in ways that you may never have thought of before. And sometimes (like in the Eddie Murphy hat) the outcome is something so brilliant you'd want to do the adult version the same way lol!

Also kudos to you for being able to costume all those kids!!!!! That is an undertaking for sure!

This is for the annual daycare production that seems to grow every year. Last year the kids performed at the El Cerrito Theater, where it seats 700. For some reason, the school refused to let us use the balcony area to seat an additional 300, so people were forced to stand alongside the walls.

The kids have been learning their dances for a few weeks now. It's really an amazing show, considering the time and effort involved to teach the kids their dances. Here is something about last year's show which was posted on YouTube: http://youtu.be/osICWtnlkq8

The older children that you see performing no longer attend the daycare but they did as children. They come and practice after school once a week....and as it gets closer to the show the practice sessions are more frequent and longer. Two weeks before the show the kids are expected to be there daily to practice. It's really tough for the kids but we figure it's for character-building...and the results are fabulous.

I bought 6.5 yards of sparkly polka-dot fabric with a 40% off coupon, and 2 yards of fleather with a 50% off coupon. Total of the purchase was about $45 which included some more glue sticks and 4 more foam visors which I will use for the headdresses. Running total is now $280.75, which totals about $19 per kid...

I covered up a 1-inch ribbon with the mylar tape, and glued that down to the gold wings to serve as suspenders so the weight of the wings would be on the shoulders. I will also glue down the wings to each other where they criss cross. Not sure yet about the side straps...maybe one side will be permanently glued on while the other side will have a velcro. But re-thinking a better solution than velcro because it's so easy to leave a permanent crease on the gold bits if the foam underneath bends. Still pondering about a solution. Hmmmm.....Perhaps just a simple buckle, but I won't know yet until I cross that bridge...

I also ended up wrapping the back edges of the foam with more mylar tape because some of it was threatening to peel off.

Very excited--this fit Dylan perfectly.

Here's what I am thinking for one of the side straps of the gold pieces of the outfit, so it can be taken on and off without bending/crushing the foam if I were to use just velcro, and placing it where it is easily accessible yet hidden from view:

I ended up cutting this and using it as a reinforcement to prevent the foam from getting crushed because I decided to go with Velcro to fasten the sides together.

The bird thing on the sides, which cover up the seam where the edges meet, is mylar-covered cardboard and is hot glued down.

Here is the back side...very rough but it will do the job.

The start of the belt. I sewed the ribbon to some elastic, and I plan to cover it with sandwiches of cardboard which I will hot glue down and then cover up with mylar. I may have to treat the sandwiches which end up on the elastic a little differently, but hopefully it will work. The belt will be easy on and off, just like the rest of the costume.

If I can't find any small enough carabiners, I may have to just reinforce the back of the foam with more plastic and just use velcro to keep the side straps (which go under the arms) in place.

Going to splurge and buy this in the ruby color because I don't want to cut out more than 200 ovals out of glitter paper, and I will hot glue it down. I think I have suffered enough as it is.

Acrylic 18x13mm oval jewels are 1/2" x 11/16. They have two holes for sewing onto fabrics. They are flat back with square faceting on the Transparent colors have a foil back. The size sounds about right...but I should measure to make sure it will work.

Fitting: need to rework the neck and make it slimmer, slim the shirt down as well. Make the belt...sew the pants (very simple pants!!)...and rig the side bands that go under the arms that will probably help to stabilize the outfit while he is dancing...add the red dots...and then call it a day for this outfit. Plus I have to spray more gold on this top. Too bad some greedy person bought all of the gold stretch fabric before I could get to it...

Looks like I need to adjust the outfit--to make the tips of the wings sit lower on the front of the outfit. Thinking perhaps removing a feather or two of the wing and adjusting the strap will do the job. Would so kill for a costume dummy right now. Dylan is really impatient and can't stand still enough...have to rush through the fitting sessions. Must...try...to....be....patient...!!!

Five more outfits to sew (king, queen, jester, soldier, MJ's outfit), and then I start on the arm bands, wrist bands, anklets, collars for the girls, headdresses for the 3 dancers and 4 of the girls. Whew. I better order those red dots--I only need 110 because of the overlap, but will order 150 of those dots just in case.

Edited to say: I just ordered 160 of those flatback acrylic in red/ruby color...from a different source, and had to order this amount because there was a minimum purchase. 14/10mm ovals. It cost around $24.15 after s/h. Running total is now $359.18...which is about $23 per child. I still need to buy at least 3 yards of white fabric....although I have been using everything sparingly. My maximum allotment is $400.

Dylan confessed that he HATES to wear costumes. Sigh. There goes my plan to dress him up in full ape gear someday. Perhaps the tide will change...must try to be patient because you can't force this on anyone.

I slimmed down that undershirt, and I was going to fuss with adding a zipper so that the neck would fit better but I really have no time to mess with it anymore. I finished adding the jewels to the golden part of the MJ outfit....and also shortened the wings by a bit so now the fit is better. The only thing I'm really upset about but I will live with it is that the wings cross over the opposite way because when I glued down the center cardboard to prevent creasing the foam, I did not look at the reference photograph. I don't think anyone but me will notice....so instead of the left wing going over the right wing, it goes under the right wing. Oh well...must push on.

The fitting went well--there was only one child that could barely get into her dress because the fabric I purchased did not have as much stretch...or the way I sewed it, the stretch was vertical not horizontal...so I will have to re-do that dress. I am taking a shortcut and going to re-sew the small dress into the queen's outfit. I just have to extend the skirt with some gorgeous leftover fabric I found.

I am a collar-making machine! I need to make one dozen...so glad that the 2 yards of vinyl was able to produce this many collars. I will have to make the king and queen's collars more spectacular than everyone else's...

Brandon, who will be playing Magic Johnson's part shall wear this collar, which includes chimp hieroglyphs that I drew out with a glue gun. I used the leftover jewels I had from MJ's outfit, and found some beaded trim in my stash that I probably won't use anyway...

Wow...so...11 more collars to go! I am going to draw random Egyptian hieroglyphs with the glue so that will minimize the number of jewels we have to use.

Ran out of gold spray so I will see if I can find some buckles in addition to the spray when I go to the fabric store.

Oh..this photo is so wrong. I'm going to have to make one with gorilla hieroglyphs!

Queens bracelets and the collars which still need the jewels added on:

Gold spray at an auto supply store was only $7.50 for 11 ounces. At Michael's it was $6.50 for 8 ounces. I also did an even exchange for some glue sticks that were the wrong size. Glad that Michael's finally carried the long glue sticks so that saves time with reloading.

Queen's collar. Again, patterns are drawn with hot glue. The beading is from old curtains that used to hang at my old house. I will use the fabric from the curtain for the extra kids they sprang on me.

Man, I wish I'd seen this thread about three months ago. My friend owns Michael's costume from this video (given to him by the King of Pop himself). Now he's in Isreal working on a movie and won't be back for a few months. I was at his house about 3 months ago and he showed me the beast. It's beautiful in real life. I'll see if he has any pics on his laptop with him.

I am slowly chugging along with these costumes. I ordered side release snap hooks, and I will use those to hold the MJ wings in place under the arms. I will also wait for those to be delivered before I attempt the belt...I think it will make life easier than futzing with the belt system I was thinking of...

So annoyed with myself--the curtain fabric I accidentally cut too small so that I did not have enough room for the waist, so I had to switch gears and fit that for the king. Luckily Ashton is super tiny. I just made these fat shorts that I trimmed with gold fabric.